Julia Goren on "Petitioning For Life"

Soon after arriving in Israel, a family friend named Zoya discovered she was pregnant with a second child and went in for the abortion routine. She was dumbfounded to encounter the following whispered line of questioning from the admitting nurse: "Do you not have a roof over your head?" There was a roof. "Do you not have enough food on the table?" There was plenty of food. Then an altogether alien concept to Zoya: "So why kill it?"

"I was shocked," Zoya recalled. "No one had ever told me I was killing anything. I'd never thought of it as a person. As soon as someone told me I was killing something, I didn't even consider it. I left." Much like my grandmother, today Zoya is the mother of a master violinist.

Even in the case of teen mothers-to-be, for all the ruination and dead dreams we are told will be visited upon their lives if they keep the baby, if someone has ambition to begin with, nothing has to stand in her way. Consider the story of Beverly D'Onofrio, dramatized in the 2001 Penny Marshall movie, "Riding in Cars with Boys." Beverly, played by Drew Barrymore, gets knocked up at 15. She marries the father, an older boy, only to discover that he is a drug addict. Over the next few years, things at home fall apart and the two separate, with Beverly retaining custody.

While for a time her opportunities are more limited than they would otherwise be (a chance to get into an elite writing program at New York University is dashed when she has to bring the kid with her to the interview), ultimately her dreams stay intact and her personal story paves a way to literary and cinematic success--not an easy feat even for the privileged. Beverly D'Onofrio got to have her cake and eat it too, and while the men in her life since no doubt have come and gone, she will always have her son.

The whole thing should be read.

HT:GFL